ok so I am following the reccommendations here- my dd had lice for over a week before we noticed, I checked, but she has super thick hair so I didn't see anything,so all her itching I thought was just dry scalp like I get sometimes. So anyway when I was drying her hair a few days ago I saw a bunch of them so needless to say she had a really bad case, I bought a homeopathic treatment at the natural foods store and left it on for an hour and combed out a whole bunch of them, but now she is left with a TON of the eggs in her hair. She has a tender head so we decided to cut her hair short for summer and layer it more so I think that will help. but she still has a ton of the nits- is there anything to kill them? we have been washing all her bedding daily and vaccuming the whole house daily, what should we be doing to her head at this point?

You need to obsessively comb for nits. It's not fun, but that's the way to get rid of them. Buy a metal comb because the plastic ones have terrible reviews.

At the time I was researching, there is nothing that can kill the nits. However, I read that 50/50 vinegar/water help loosen up the glue that holds the nit to the hair.

Keep the hair rubbed down with oil every 2-3 days over night. IIRC, you have about 7 days between a nit hatching and it laying more nits, so you want to kill any newly hatched nits that you missed before they reproduce.

__________________
INTJ

DS1-12/2006
DS2-04/2008
DS3-12/2009

You cannot be too gentle, too kind. Shun even to appear harsh in your treatment of each other. Joy, radiant joy, streams from the face of him who gives and kindles joy in the heart of him who receives. All condemnation is from the devil. Never condemn each other. ... Keep silent, refrain from judgment. This will raise you above the deadly arrows of slander, insult and outrage and will shield your glowing hearts against all evil.

Thanks I am doing the conditioner and metal comb daily- I got a finer metal comb and that seems to be helping...those darn nits some of them are just so tiny...it hasn;t been a full week since we started treatment so trying to comb hair daily for another week or so to be on the safe side- we have a new baby due anytime so really wanting to get this over with...

Don't give up after a week though. You still need to do the oil in the hair every 3 days for 3 weeks (IIRC, I may be wrong) because you need to kill babies hatched from the nits before they are big enough to lay nits. You can probably slow down on the nitcombing to every 3 days too after the first week. If you stay on top of smothering any newly hatched babies before they lay eggs, it should wipe them out assuming that you have killed all the adults too.

__________________
INTJ

DS1-12/2006
DS2-04/2008
DS3-12/2009

You cannot be too gentle, too kind. Shun even to appear harsh in your treatment of each other. Joy, radiant joy, streams from the face of him who gives and kindles joy in the heart of him who receives. All condemnation is from the devil. Never condemn each other. ... Keep silent, refrain from judgment. This will raise you above the deadly arrows of slander, insult and outrage and will shield your glowing hearts against all evil.

OK so it has been 2 weeks since any sign of adult lice, we did see one juvenile in my ds's hair 3 days ago so we did an oil treatment and combed it out and there was nothing else. we have been vacuuming all the carpet in the house every day and changing all the kids bedding every day.l we have gone down to washing/combing hair out every 3 days- I haven't seen any nits in over a week, how much longer do we need to keep this all up?

We checked about every 3 days and then once a week and even now I check them now and then, and it's been over a year. I'm paranoid, esp now that the kids are playing t-ball/ baseball/ softball and sharing helmets with other kids.

Hi Folks! There have been some requests to sticky my post about lice, and I'm sorry to say that my employer has requested that I not post massive amount of lice advice online. I work for a business treating head lice. You can see our website here: http://www.mnlicelady.com/ It's part of a non-compete agreement for me to not publicly offer detailed lice advice online.

However, please know that there is a ton good information at the site listed above. Everything on our website is research-based. You'll want to click on the Myths-Facts link at the top of the page. The "Cleaning" portion of the website is a bit outdated, as we no longer recommend cleaning at all. Lice have been proven over & over again to only live on human heads. We offer a 30 Day guarantee at our salon, and we give everyone the advice not to clean.

I can take PMs regarding lice. Please don't hesitate if you have more questions.

Shoot. Midnight cafe, when I clicked this thread I was going to say " hey! Poke MCafe!! She had some amazing lice info but i can't remember any of the details "
Serves me right for not writing it down when you first shared it!!!

Stiina! I copied out some things I wrote in another thread. I think this much is ok to post here since it isn't treatment advice:

Don't worrying about cleaning your house. We offer our clients a 60 day guarantee, and we do NOT recommend cleaning your house. It is a fallacy that lice live in the environment. They do not. The research demonstrates that this is true. (NOTE: They *could* live for 48 hours off the human head, but they CHOOSE not to climb off the head because the risk that they will die before finding another head is pretty high. They are only transferred from person to person through hair to hair contact.)

Don't use lice treatment products like Rid or Nix. The lice in the U.S. are becoming resistant to these products, and they only work on 40-50% of live bugs. Nothing kills nits at all. They must be combed/nitpicked out of the hair.

You need a comb called The Terminator. This is the only comb worth having. You can buy it online or at some health food stores and kid's hair salons.

Your head can itch for days after getting rid of lice. The bites are like mosquito bites and take a while to heal.

The reason people believe that you must clean your entire house from top to bottom and bag everything is because people very seldom get all the nits out of their hair on the first go-round. It takes 7-10 days for nits to hatch and another 10-12 days for those bugs to grow into adults and begin laying eggs. So, when you have nits that were not removed, it looks like you have gotten lice again 2-4 weeks after the initial treatment. People have assumed for years that this means that the lice were still living in the furniture and stuffed animals, etc, but that is not the case. The truth is that the nits were missed in the initial treatment.

If you choose to go to a lice treatment business, be sure to look for one that is Shepherd Certified. This is the only certified method of lice treatment in the country.

Winniewildflower, Here's the deal: Sometimes, especially if a head is not terribly infested, some method of treatment or another will work. Maybe there were not a lot of lice on your head to begin with, you killed the hatched ones with Delacet (unusual, but not impossible), and you didn't have enough nits left to hatch out both a male and a female to keep perpetuating the life cycle. Lice hatch at the rate of 3 females to every male. Also, a head with dreads is not ideal for head lice. They don't have the freedom to climb around, as they do in straight hair, and it's possible that the males and females couldn't find each other or that the females couldn't find a whole lot of space to lay eggs.

Mostly I want to discourage people from using the chemical treatments because they're toxic and unlikely to work. Then you've wasted the money AND exposed everybody in your house to some fairly toxic pesticides.

A variety of opinions and ideas are shared on GCM. Personal experiences, suggestions, and tips found here are in no way intended to substitute for medical counsel from a healthcare professional. Always use your own good judgement and seek professional advice when in doubt about a health concern.